Whitby council goes paperless

Whitby council goes paperless

Ryan Pfeiffer / Metroland

WHITBY -- Whitby town hall is going paperless in the new year with each member of council receiving a new iPad in an effort to transition from paper (pictured is a three-week cycle binder) to electronic agendas and meetings. From left, Councillor Tracy Hanson, Councillor Michael Emm and Susan Cassel, the e-agenda project co-ordinator. December 21, 2012.

WHITBY -- In an effort to reduce the Town's overall paper consumption, councillors are starting the new year by making the leap to electronic agendas.

When council reconvenes on Monday, Jan. 7, each elected official will be able to access, view and annotate their meeting agendas using a mobile application on individual iPads.

"Sustainability is certainly one of our strategic goals at the Town so we wanted to lead the way in information technology with the introduction of paperless council and standing meetings," says Whitby's clerk, Debi Wilcox.

The CivicWeb meeting management system from iCompass Technologies not only provides cost savings on paper and ink but also cuts down on the amount of time staff spends printing, organizing and distributing pages to councillors.

"We're still going to produce our paper copies for the public but the ability with this system is we will flash the agenda up on the screen so members of the public will always know what item we're on," says Ms. Wilcox.

"It gets confusing sometimes when we're going through items ... this way they'll know exactly what report is being discussed and the recommendation will be up on the screen for them to follow."

The software cost the Town about $25,000 to purchase, as well as an annual fee. The estimated cost savings associated with the new system are about $42,000 per year. This includes paper cost reductions, print cost reductions, agenda preparation time savings, post-meeting time savings and agenda distribution savings. Over five years, those savings are estimated to amount to more than $200,000 or the equivalent of about 400 trees saved.

Achieving an overall reduction in the Town's use of paper was one of the issues Centre Ward Councillor Michael Emm highlighted while campaigning in the 2010 municipal election.

"In our hallway (at town hall) we have the table there and sometimes, we're left with piles of unused agendas and although the paper does get recycled, the costs are still astronomical for staff time and printing and copying because it all adds up," Coun. Emm says.

"When the numbers were relayed to me -- the cost of the iPad versus the printing of agendas -- it was a no-brainer to go ahead and make this decision to go paperless."
Reporter Parvaneh Pessian covers the town of Whitby for Metroland Media Group's Durham Region Division